Wheatley Group to provide £30m housing boost for Glasgow

A Glasgow community is in line for a £30 million boost that will see more than 170 new affordable homes built and hundreds of existing houses upgraded.

Wheatley Group and two of its housing associations, GHA and Cube, are behind the major investment in Milton in the north of the city.

In the first phase of new housing, 70 homes for social rent will be built on empty land at Liddesdale Road. The homes, which include 21 amenity flats specially adapted for older people and seven for wheelchair users, are being brought forward by Cube with the £7.4m project being partly funded through a grant from Glasgow City Council. Contractor City Building (Contracts) is due to start work on the site in April.

GHA is meanwhile developing plans for 54 more new homes at Cathay Street in Milton. The £6m project is expected to start in 2017 subject to planning consent and grant approval from Scottish Government.

Outdated and unpopular flats in Scaraway Street, Shapinsay Street, Egilsay Street and Vallay Street will be demolished by GHA after more than 96 per cent of local people supported proposals for demolition. Local GHA staff are currently working with all the residents to help them move into new homes of their choice before the £1.3m demolition project begins.

Once the demolition at the Scaraway site is complete, GHA plans to build 50 more homes for mid-market rent on the site. Talks are also under way between Wheatley and Glasgow City Council on the wider regeneration of the area. This phase of the regeneration of Milton is expected to involve a further £6m investment.

As part of the overall £30m investment, GHA and Cube are also upgrading and modernising their existing homes in the area with GHA carrying out £9m of improvements over the next five years. Cube will also be installing new kitchens and showers in its homes in the area.

GHA chair Gordon Sloan said: “We listened carefully to people in Milton during a community consultation. What people told us was that many of the existing tenements are just no longer the kind of homes people want to live in. The new homes Cube and GHA will build, and the improvements to existing homes, will make a huge difference to the community and I look forward to seeing our plans take shape.”

Cube chair Liz Ruine said: “Cube is delighted to be playing its part in making Milton a better place to live long into the future. The new homes, particularly the amenity flats for older people will provide much-needed affordable housing for people in the area.”

“Families in the Milton area will reap the benefits from these new environmentally-friendly affordable houses because they are easier to heat, helping to drive down energy bills and tackle fuel poverty.

“The Scottish Government will continue to do all it can to support similar developments, not only in Glasgow, but across the whole of Scotland.

“Our new target to deliver 50,000 affordable homes over the next five years is bold, credible and affordable. This is a 67% increase in completed homes over the next five year period.”

Councillor Frank McAveety, leader of Glasgow City Council, said: “The creation of 170 new – and hundreds more refurbished - homes is great news for Milton. I am particularly delighted with the building of new homes for older people. All of this work reflects the huge number of new homes being built in the city just now.”

The new homes being built by Cube and GHA in Milton have been made possible through the issue of a £300m public bond on the capital markets by Wheatley Group in late 2014. The money raised is being used to help deliver 3000 homes across Central Scotland.